An interactive data tool launched by WHO reveals for the first time the current and future financial cost of health care for women living with conditions caused by female genital mutilation (FGM). The total costs amount to USD 1.4 billion annually. The FGM Cost Calculator is being launched on this year’s International Day of Zero Tolerance…
Vaccination, screening, treatment and palliative care are the key interventions of WHO’s Draft Global Strategy towards the Elimination of Cervical Cancer as a Public Health Problem, the fourth most common cancer in women. On World Cancer Day, new estimates show that this strategy could save more than 62 million girls and women from a cervical…
WHO has declared 2020 as the International Year of the Nurse and the Midwife to mark the bicentenary of the birth of the founder of modern nursing, Florence Nightingale and to recognize the critical contribution both professions make to global health. May is a key moment to catalyse high-level dialogue and collaborative engagements for moving…
In a new position paper, published in the Weekly Epidemiological Record today, WHO recommends vaccination against tick-borne encephalitis in people of all ages where the disease is highly endemic. Where the prevaccination incidence of the disease is moderate or low or is limited to particular geographical locations or certain outdoor activities, immunization should target individuals…
As climate and commercial threats intensify, WHO-UNICEF-Lancet Commission presses for radical rethink on child health No single country is adequately protecting children’s health, their environment and their futures, finds a landmark report released today by a Commission of over 40 child and adolescent health experts from around the world. The Commission was convened by the…
Peru shows the way forward and the courage of Ander Martinez “When Ander was diagnosed, I didn´t have the possibility to cover the cost of the treatment. It was very expensive, and I had nothing,” says Rosalina Tocto, 29 years mother of Ander Martínez Tocto. Ander had just been diagnosed with acute leukemia at the…
Good afternoon everyone and apologies for being late, and apologies too from Dr Tedros, who is just about to land in the Democratic Republic of the Congo where he is following up on important Ebola matters and meeting with President Tshisekdi and many others to look at the future post-Ebola of the health system in…
Government ministers and senior officials from over 100 countries will meet in Stockholm, Sweden from 19-20 February to discuss new steps to halve road traffic deaths and injuries by 2030, in line with global targets agreed in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). “The fact that an estimated 1.35 million lives are lost every…
Joint statement by UNFPA Executive Director Dr Natalia Kanem, UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore and UN Women Executive Director Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka and WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on the occasion of International Day of Zero Tolerance for Female Genital Mutilation – “When Tabitha was growing up in rural Kenya, most of her 16-year-old peers…
Female genital mutilation (FGM) exacts a crippling economic as well as human cost, according to World Health Organization (WHO). “FGM is not only a catastrophic abuse of human rights that significantly harms the physical and mental health of millions of girls and women; it is also a drain on a country’s vital economic resources,” said…